Owen pulled the blanket from the object that he’d brought up with him. It was an old-fashioned bird-cage made of metal rods, flat on the bottom and curved on the top, but the thing inside wasn’t a canary. In fact, Gwen wasn’t sure what it was. It’s body was long and thin and winged, but it looked cowed.
‘This,’ Owen announced, ‘is Paul. He’s gone solo and reinvented himself.’
‘Seriously,’ Jack said. ‘What is that thing?’
‘Seriously, it’s the next stage in the life cycle of the worms.’
‘It’s a flying egg-layer with extreme prejudice,’ Ianto added helpfully, bringing in a tray full of coffees.
‘The worm lurks in the gut, absorbing nutrients, until the host dies,’ Owen explained. ‘The worm then turns into this thing, which flies around until it can bury itself in something living — probably some kind of grazing animal, but I’m sure anything would do. We’ll call that the secondary host. This thing lays eggs, and dies. The eggs are then eaten by whatever eats the secondary host, and the cycle starts all over again.’
‘And I’m sure that on its home planet it works out perfectly,’ Jack said, ‘but here on Earth it’s trying to impose itself on a different set of hosts, and I’m not going to let that happen. And I also want to know where Doctor Scotus fits into all this, which brings us on to what Toshiko and I did this afternoon. Using that alien tech which amplifies distant emotions, we triangulated on a place on the outskirts of Cardiff where there’s a large concentration of very hungry people. Either there’s a Weight Watchers convention going on, or Doctor Scotus’s clinic is up and running somewhere else.’
‘Why would he get all the people who have taken the pill already to congregate together?’ Gwen asked. ‘It doesn’t make sense.’
‘Remember the attempt to kidnap Lucy Sobel?’ Jack asked. ‘I think Doctor Scotus has realised his little pills are having side effects, and he’s trying to get the evidence off the streets. I think when we get there we’ll find that he’s managed to scoop up most, if not all, of the kids who bought into his little weight-loss scheme, and he’s probably wondering right now what he’s going to do with them. So get ready, boys and girls, because we’re not going to let this go on any longer. I can accept a lot in life, but preying on the helpless and the gullible is out of line. I want you armed and ready to go in ten minutes.’ He glanced over at the cage on the table, and the creature that sulked within it. ‘And bring Paul. I think I may have a use for him.’
EIGHTEEN
The sun was setting over towards the centre of the city, silhouetting the expensive high-rise hotels against a background of scarlet, purple and blue. From her position squashed in the back of the SUV, Gwen could see past a concrete jetty to where water roiled, thick and slow.
‘Where the hell are we?’ Owen asked as the SUV coasted to a halt under Ianto’s careful hands. He got out of the car and looked around, hands on hips. ‘Don’t think I’ve ever been around here before.’
‘You know the bit of Cardiff Docks that was redeveloped into an expensive marina where they hold dragon boat races and stuff?’ Jack asked as he too climbed out of the car.
‘Yeah.’
‘This isn’t it.’
Gwen slid out of the passenger side. ‘Somewhere over near Bute East Dock?’ she ventured, recognising the angle at which she was seeing some of the taller tower blocks. She reached back into the car and retrieved the bird-cage in which Owen and Ianto had imprisoned the flying thing. An improvised cover had been placed over it, shielding the creature from casual attention.
‘Spot on,’ said Jack. He looked around, hair ruffling in the breeze coming in off the bay. ‘Ianto — I want you here, with the engine running. We may need to get out in a hurry. Everybody else, are you tooled up?’
Last out of the SUV, Gwen checked her Glock 17. It was big and clumsy and heavy, and every time she fired it she thought she was going to fracture her wrist, but she knew she was going to need it. That was Torchwood for you. ‘Check,’ she said.
‘Check,’ Owen confirmed.
‘Check,’ softly from Toshiko.
‘And that’s a big Texas check from me too,’ Jack finished. ‘Just because I’m the boss it doesn’t mean I can get out of these things.’ He indicated a low building with a much larger extension on one end over near where the water rolled back and forth like a caged animal. ‘This whole area was part of the dock operations a hundred years or so ago. That building over there was a meat-packing factory, turning imported frozen carcasses from Argentina into stuff you can put on shelves and keep for ever. The place closed down back in the 1970s, and there were so many holding companies and front companies involved that nobody can track down who owns it now, so it’s standing right in the way of redevelopment. Toshiko and I identified it as a hunger hotspot earlier on. Apt, I suppose. I’m guessing this is where Doctor Scotus is hiding out.’
‘What’s the plan?’ Gwen asked, coming alongside Jack.
‘We go in, we get the innocent parties out, kill any worm or flying thing we can find, destroy all the diet pills, leave, have dinner and sleep the sleep of the just. Did I leave anything out?’
‘That’s a strategy,’ Gwen said. ‘What about the tactics?’
Jack stared at her. ‘We go in,’ he repeated, ‘we get the innocent parties out, kill any worm or flying thing we can find, destroy all the diet pills, leave, have dinner and sleep the sleep of the just.’
‘OK, just checking.’ Gwen raised her eyebrows. ‘I always like to know what’s expected of me.’
‘Problem is,’ Jack said, ‘we don’t know what’s going on in there. Always difficult to come up with tactics when you don’t know what you’re facing. If you try, you might end up facing a tank with a peashooter or trying to kill a mosquito with an elephant gun. Best tactic is not to have a tactic. Play it by ear.’
‘And what happens when it all goes wrong?’
‘That’s the great thing about not having tactics,’ Jack grinned. ‘Whatever happens, you can claim that’s what you intended.’
He led the way across to the building. ‘According to the plans that Toshiko called up,’ he said over his shoulder, ‘there’s a side door along here. We’ll go in that way.’
‘Tactics?’ Gwen muttered.
‘Nearest door,’ Jack replied.
The door was padlocked, but a few seconds with the Leatherman and it was open.
‘Where did you learn to do that?’ Owen asked, impressed.
‘You pick these things up when you’re in the police.’
The door opened inwards onto a corridor that ran left and right along the side of the building. Jack looked both ways, then pointed down to the right. ‘Owen, Tosh — you take that way. Gwen and I will head left. Scout the place out, don’t alert anyone to your presence, meet back here in ten minutes, try not to touch anything or set off any alarms.’
‘Tactics!’ Gwen said beneath her breath as she picked the shrouded bird-cage up from where she had left it.
‘Common sense,’ Jack said.
As Owen and Toshiko went off to the right, Jack set off along the corridor to the left. The floor was dusty along the edges, but clear in the centre, Gwen could make out wheel tracks in the dust. ‘There’s been some traffic along here,’ she said, nodding towards it. ‘And recently.’
‘I’d feel more comfortable,’ Jack admitted, ‘if we actually knew what this Scotus guy is up to. That way we could just burst in and stop him. Trouble is, we need to find out what he’s doing first, and then stop him, which complicates things.’